Palestinian Authority forces are clashing with armed groups in the occupied West Bank in a rare crackdown aimed at restoring order in a militant stronghold.

Following a ten-day siege, the Palestinian Authority began, on December 14, a violent raid on the Jenin refugee camp in the northern West Bank. The PA security forces used similar tactics as used by the Israeli occupation forces in their routine attacks on the area.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday that more than 3,000 North Korean soldiers have been killed and wounded in Russia's Kursk region and warned that Pyongyang could send more personnel and equipment for Moscow's army.

At least eight people were killed by Israeli military operations in the northern West Bank around the city of Tulkarem on Tuesday, the Palestinian Health Ministry said, including three people it said were killed by Israeli airstrikes.

In the north of the occupied West Bank, operations by Palestinian special forces against the Jenin Battalion, which brings together various armed factions, have killed two people.

The Palestinian government has been carrying out a rare and lethal sweep against militants in a flashpoint West Bank city, saying it was needed to foil an imminent car-bombing and other attacks.

Palestinian security forces have launched a rare crackdown against local militant groups in the northern West Bank.

Israeli forces killed at least eight Palestinians in raids on Tuesday on a refugee camp near the city of Tulkarm in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, Palestinian and Israeli officials said.

For more than a week, the sprawling Jenin refugee camp in the occupied West Bank has echoed to the sound of heavy gunfire – with masked snipers on roof tops and muffled explosions within its warren of alleyways.

The black-clad militants of Jenin refugee camp raced through sewage-filled alleyways to dodge gunfire echoing all around. “Quickly,” a Palestinian fighter urged as they weaved through a network of armed patrols and improvised barricades.

The Palestinian Authority insists that its operation in the Jenin refugee camp was intended to maintain security and thwart any Israeli plans for the West Bank. Yet other Palestinian factions have criticized the move,